Hey there,
I've recently been working on an essay (the academic sort) that has to do with disability narratives and visual novels. One (potential) obstacle to developing it further is a lack of primary texts.

Now, this started, quite predictably with Katawa Shoujo, and I'd like to know: are there other VNs that feature the lived experience of disability and/or chronic illness as a major part of the story?

To be more specific, it would be best if it constituted a defining aspect of either the entire game, or the entirety of one 'route,' but in the case of the latter, not simply as an ending or consequence of the rest of the story.

In "Kimi Ga Nozomu Eien", someone got an accident and paralyzed. In "EF Tales", someone got brain problem (dementia) despite the young age... and similar theme also used in anime "Isshukan Friend" - or "One Week Friend". In "Little Buster", someone also got brain problem (narcolepsy). In "Air", many people got mental/brain problem and one of them ended up died (unless someone magically saves her). In "Narcissu", some people are waiting for their final day with a terminal heart disease. In "Clannad", someone is physically weak since childhood... spoiler warning... and finally ended up dead after giving birth (unless someone, which can't raise his arm due to broken collar bone, can magically saves her).

I'd love to read your essay when it's done! I'm not sure I know about any more with physical illnesses or disabilities that indoneko didn't already list, but I can think of some good ones for mental illness:

All of the love interests in The Fruit of Grisaia have some serious issues with past trauma and whatnot. Although it's very long, so it might not be feasible for you analyze it depending on when your deadline is.

And the protagonist of Saya no Uta has something seriously wrong with his brain, but it's not a particular illness that actually exists or anything, so it might not be as useful to you.

Come to think of it, there's also Love at First Sight, in which the main heroine only has one eye. But in the sense of being a fantasy-style cyclops, not a normal human with an eye missing, so it might not be exactly what you're looking for either. Hope some of those help!

Well, looks like I have my work cut out for me sorting through these o:
Thanks for the recommendations~

indoneko wrote:Tare you only focusing on the narration from the patient (i.e the firsthand experience of the illness/disability), or do you also write about the people who supports the patient?

In the case of Katawa Shoujo I hadn't considered this much, since the two characters I'd focused on (Hisao and Rin) were both themselves disabled. They also, in a sense, supported each other. I'd say that stories from people other than the ill/disabled persons themselves would factor into it, but it would be important to have reliable (in narrative/POV terms) access to the ill/disabled person's story, still.

parttimestorier wrote:there's also Love at First Sight, in which the main heroine only has one eye. But in the sense of being a fantasy-style cyclops, not a normal human with an eye missing, so it might not be exactly what you're looking for either. Hope some of those help!

This looks quite interesting, and in line with other ideas rolling around in my head, if not the essay at hand. Thanks for the heads-up on this one!

I just thought of one anime: Yuuki Yuna wants to be a hero.
Start around eps 6 or 7, they experienced physical disabilities like one eye blind, mute, cannot taste anything etc. Also from the beginning one character was on the wheel chair the whole time.

The Fruit of Grisaia is more like mental illness not physical ones.

Witcher (book and video game) Geralt cannot reproduce due to mutation... So not a normal medical case study but it's something...

Guts from berserk (manga and anime): lost one arm and blind in one eye, and still fights like a madman.

A Close Shave:
*Last Thing Done (Jul 7) Finished Emotion Matrix for Joint Customer Sprite.
*Currently Doing: Print Matrices, & decide emotions to use for Joint Sprite, think about blinking and lip flap. Maybe also about TransitionConditionSwitch?
*First Next thing to do: Code in all the sprite emotion and camera movement for Close Shave Sprite Sections
*Next Thing to Do: Code in all CG and special animation stuff
*Other Next Thing: Do SFX

Don't know if you're still looking for VNs with this criteria, but Kana - Little Sister is about a brother coming to grips with the fact that his little sister has been diagnosed with a terminal illness and accepting that she will die. Many of the scenes occur in the hospital and in flashbacks where he wishes he had treated her differently.

Narcissu is about two people with terminal illnesses, and C-14 Dating Sim has a disabled protagonist (diabetes), as well as several disabled love interests. (One has a prosthetic arm, and another is deaf.) I will have to play Narcissu again now that I am disabled, and have had several back and forths about terminal diagnoses, to evaluate it again. C-14 Dating Sim did an excellent job on its portrayal of disability.

Well, wasn't expecting this thread to get more responses o:
Thanks for all your recommendations!
C 14 sounds interesting, what with the blurred lines between chronic illness and disability.
Also, I'll admit I hadn't quite thought of Geralt's condition in The Witcher that way, but then my exposure to that's been limited to watching other people play it.

As a status update(?), I'll be trying to work this topic into a passable research proposal for further studies *fingers crossed.*
I did complete an essay on reading disability in VNs for a class on literary research, specifically about Rin's route in Katawa Shoujo, but it needs some work in the theoretical framework. I'm thinking of making a shorter (the current draft being just over 20 pages, double-spaced), less academic version for posting online sometime in the future.